Why I love December

December 17th: Celebrated the wonderfully beautiful wedding day of my future sister-in-law, Callie

Same day: Watched my fiance proudly walk his sister down the aisle, giving away the bride, while tears in turn streamed down my face

December 20th (tonight): spent the night in our living room next to the Christmas tree, listening to Sufjan Stevens' Christmas album while my mom and I both address our Christmas cards. Dusty and I are sending out Save the Dates this year for Christmas. Our amazing photographer, Britt, captured our engagement session a couple of weeks ago and you can check them out on Facebook, here.

December 19th (last night): had an unplanned night with Dust to PARROT VIDEO in White Bear Lake, your one-stop shop for tanning, consignment, and video rentals. Being that Dusty and I are huge movie people, the sudden disappearance of the neighborhood Blockbuster has gotten us down. We found this old hidden gem on a drive recently, stopped in (it's kind of ghetto, not gonna lie) and rented PIRAHNA (1978!) as well as Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (I didn't watch it). What an amazing thing to be able to rent videos again! (I think the tanning is what keeps the place running)

December 16th: A student of mine (rather shy) waited until the end of her class period to find me and give me an envelope with a card inside. It was simple, but thanked me for being her American Government teacher. It made my entire day.

Last night, again: Woke up at 2 a.m. to a lonely beast (my dog) who decided to sleep in my room for the rest of the night. Right at my feet.

I have had a pretty good December, so far. I can't wait for the rest of this week. Merry Christmas!

If you are interested in seeing what our Christmas cards look like, check out my last post! I changed them slightly by getting rid of the wreath, but you get the general idea.

Photo Card

Wreath Monogram Christmas

Shutterfly has classic, elegant Christmas invitations for your party.

View the entire collection of cards.

Guys with long hair: Yay or Nay?

A couple weeks ago, I was ranting on Facebook about how sick I am of the "hipster" black rimmed glasses look. This is largely due to the fact that half the people I encounter sporting this look have perfect vision and don't NEED the glasses. Thus making it an annoyance to me.

If you type "hipsters wearing glasses" into Google, this image pops up. Bleh.

My rants aren't ending with the black hipster glasses today. I have a new irritation that I feel I need to vent about. It seems that I can't turn on ESPN or any other channel really without having to look at a guy who's hair is longer than mine. It's the Clay Matthews syndrome. It's gross, it's unnatural, and it's kind of unnerving to know that there are males out there in the world who have the ability to grow hair longer than mine.

I'm sorry... but I just can't. I can't see the beauty in it. I think there is something wrong with being a dude who can put his hair into a bun. I simply can not appreciate Clay Matthew's (because I am a Vikings fan) or his long greasy hair (because I think it's ugly). I can't handle that he makes probably millions of dollars in being a spokesperson for Suave. It makes me mad.

The thing that makes me laugh is that it's become a fad. My dad coaches college football, and I can count maybe six players who are currently donning this look, proudly. The guy athletes at my school are all about the long locks. They are also big into the pony tail, the half pony, you know, hairstyles that I usually rock on a good hair day.

So what I am wondering, is how other long haired male celebrities fare in your eyes... is it sexy or simply stupid to be a guy with long flowing tresses? Here are some fairly current examples I came up with. I'll let you be the judge.

Kid Rock. My vote on whether his look is okay: NO.

David Beckham. My vote: Yes. As far as I'm concerned, he can wear his hair any old way he wants and I won't find a single thing to complain about.

Bruce Jenner: not so sure about the hair, but could someone get me the name of his plastic surgeon?

Russell Brand: No.

Troy Polamalu- Personally, I like Troy's hair. But that's because it has character. It's not stringy, greasy, and straight like Clay's. Fun Fact- did you know that in the NFL, long hair is considered part of one's uniform, therefore, one may be legally tackled by the HAIR?! Ouch.

I guess I'm torn on the issue. Some guys look great with long hair, and others look stupid. Maybe I am biased because I'm marrying a guy who's best look (in my opinion) is when he is bald, but that's just me. As my grandmother Bev would say, it takes all kinds.

***

In other news, I'm in a bit of a slump. Who ever heard of pouring down rain in Minnesota, in DECEMBER???? White Christmas comes on the radio and I roll my eyes in disgust, because for once, I ACTUALLY WANT IT TO BE TRUE. Can you believe it? I'm complaining about there being no snow in MN. Check back in with me in a few weeks and see how my opinions have changed about that. It's okay though. I am trying my best to get in the Christmas spirit by doing the following:

-Painting my nails red

-Buying red lipstick for the first time! (it's for Callie's wedding)

-Watching Christmas television episodes on Netflix

-Lighting a spruce scented holiday candle in the kitchen, which is where I am currently sitting now. 

Also, to get myself out of the slump, I treated myself to a Target run today and bought this:

My favorite blockbuster of Summer 2011 came out on DVD. And Dust is currently on his way over to watch it. He doesn't know that I've bought it yet, but I don't care. I'll make him watch it.

The next week

Dust and I took our engagement photos today and I am SO excited to see how they turned out. I was pretty nervous all week long about the fact that it had been nearly NEGATIVE degrees outside with this crazy MN weather and I was just praying that somehow, we would have a little warmth. Well, God answered our prayers today by giving us a GORGEOUS 40 degree photoshoot. Originally, we had planned to photograph in downtown Stillwater, but over the last few days, Dust and I changed our minds and decided to use his own house for the pics! I am not regretting the decision one bit. The snow has blanketed the ground here in MN, the lake is frozen, and we got some really cool shots with the sun shining out- I can't wait to post some pictures here after they have been edited!

This weekend was fun- but once again went by all too fast. Friday night was a bachelorette party for Callie~ my future sister-in-law! It is blowing my mind that she will be a married woman by next week. We ate at Crave in Mall of America, did the whole unlimited ride wristband thing in "Nickelodeon Universe" (I miss Camp Snoopy...) and hung out at a hotel near the mall into the late night watching Callie open up scandalous presents. After the bachelorette, I realized something: I love my new family. Anytime I get the chance to hang out with the Wahl clan, I have to remind myself that I will soon join and become a part of that amazing group.

I spent Saturday basically napping the day away. I don't know what it was about this past week- I fit in a lot of material in all my classes and also had a bout of horrible sickness a couple of days that didn't help my motivation OR my energy. By the end of the week, I was spent and I stayed out fairly late on Friday night so I decided that I wasn't going to do a single thing on Saturday. I forgot to turn my alarm off on Friday night, however, and so Saturday morning, I woke up at 6:20 a.m. in a panic thinking that I was already late to work. It took a couple of minutes to remind myself that it was, in fact, Saturday, and I was NOT late for work, or anything. Don't you hate that? When you completely freak in a dazed slumber and give yourself a minor panic attack? Not the biggest deal in this case because I went RIGHT back to sleep, but still. I then woke up at 10. Ate breakfast. Sat on the couch. Watched Elf. Fell asleep for two hours. Woke up. Showered. Went shopping with Dust (sweater shopping, for the engagement pics!) It was a well spent Saturday. We wrapped up the night by attending a family friends' Christmas concert with Joe (Dusty's roommate) and Char (future mom-in-law). I got boots at Target. It was a good day.

Do you ever feel like no one is going to read your blog if there aren't pictures? I kinda do. I tend to skip over blog posts that aren't littered with images to keep me interested. Well, I suppose I just ruined today's post for everyone then, at least for those who feel the same way as I do. Too bad. I didn't take any pictures MYSELF this weekend- so you will just have to wait patiently like me to see the professional photos soon :) Otherwise, I hope you enjoyed my weekend recap. On to the next week- it is going to be a busy one. Six days until Callie becomes Mrs. Wayt. AH!

The Kiss... OF DEATH {Sort of a history post}

Never before did I think that there would be a time in my life where I spent $50 on Hershey's kisses.

There's an explanation for it, of course. It's for class tomorrow. And I bought for the whole Social Studies department at school, because tomorrow a good chunk of us are lecturing on THE PLAGUE.

We've been covering the Middle Ages now for almost two weeks, and tomorrow is the dreaded discussion on the Black Death. To be honest, I've been looking forward to the Plague talk for awhile because I'm hoping the students will respond well.

Mass hysteria at the hands of mass illness.

So I've had to brush up a tad on the causes, symptoms, and results of contracting the Plague, especially in the Middle Ages. So I have learned now that it was largely transmitted through rats and small rodents (ick) and killed in a matter of days. It was often called the Black Death because of the black swellings (called BUBOES) that covered the bodies of those afflicted. You can google pictures of this online- but I want people to come back to this site so I am choosing NOT to gross you out with the images.

So why the Hershey's kisses?

There were three major types of Plague that afflicted Europe during Medieval society.

1. The Pneumonic plague: attacked the lungs, killed in less than a week. Mostly transmitted by cough. Does not show buboes on the body, but causes extreme chest pain, uncontrollable sweating, and coughing/throwing up blood.

2. Bubonic plague: Transmitted mostly from fleas or insects. Causes swelling and pain in the lymph nodes. Causes buboes to form on the neck, in the armpits, and on the inner thigh. Eventually the buboes split open and ooze puss and blood (I can just see the looks on the kids faces now). Causes high fever, extreme nausea. Eventually, internal bleeding occurs. Most die within a week of contracting.

3. The (dreaded) Septicemic plague: Rarest form of the Plague illness. Also the most deadly. Carried mainly by rodents, and transmitted through them too. Causes red bumps to form all over the body that look similar to insect bites. Eventually leads to severe abdominal pain, bleeding, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, and very low blood pressure. Kills within 24 hours.

Aren't they cute? Just don't get too close.

When my kids walk into the door tomorrow, they will have to grab a holiday themed Hershey's kiss.  Green, Red, or Silver. I will allow the students who DON'T like chocolate to NOT grab a candy.

Anyone that picks a GREEN kiss has "contracted" the Pneumonic plague.

Anyone that picks a RED kiss has the SEPTICEMIC plague.

Anyone that picks SILVER contracts the BUBONIC plague.

The lucky few (I don't even know if anyone will choose NOT to take the candy) who choose not to eat any chocolate? DON'T contract ANY form of the Plague. YAY!

Pick your poison.

This is what my Thursday at school will consist of. A mock trial of contracting the Plague. Invoking the "kiss" of death to illustrate a horrible epidemic that eventually led to the fall of the Middle Ages.

So, what are you doing at work tomorrow?

Save the Date Banner: CHECK!

So yesterday I posted about my ambitions to create, by myself, a "Save the Date" banner for our engagement pictures next week. The cheapest banner I could find on Etsy was about $13.00 without the shipping. I didn't feel like paying for something that I felt like I could create myself. Today was a day full of nothing but relaxing so I rose to the challenge and successfully made our banner for next week's pictures!

My dad dropped me off at Michael's right after church this morning and I was in and out of the store in five minutes. I picked up some red acrylic paint, two spools of green and red ribbon, and four pieces of card stock. My total for all these items= $5.46.

Now, I am by no means a painter. In fact, I can't remember the last time I sat down with a paint brush just itching to PAINT something. And then I realized that I had forgotten to buy paint brushes at the craft store! Luckily, I have an avid fly-fishermen for a father who has small brushes on hand to create his own flies. Dad gave me two small brushes that ended up working perfect.

So then I turned back to the internet for inspiration and instructions. This is the original picture that gave me the idea for a Save the Date banner....

I figured we could replace the "Merry Christmas" with our wedding date to send out as Christmas cards to close family and friends as Save the Dates. That was when I was linked to the Etsy site and found the picture that I posted yesterday. I decided the easiest way to transfer the numbers to the card stock would be to simply print out and trace the outline, and paint. That is precisely what I ended up doing.

Me attempting to paint - surprisingly, it turned out pretty good!

After everything was painted onto the cards, I hole punched the top corners of each number card so that I could string the ribbon through.

Finished! You can even see evidence of the punched out holes in the corner.

I then had my brother take some pictures of the completed banner so that I could show my work off here on the blog.

Beau's first attempt at a banner picture turned into a crappy zoomed in Blackberry phone image. Let's try this again, Beau...

 

 

 

There we go.

So then I decided to take things even further. In the original picture, the cards were outlined in black to make it "pop." I found a black sharpie, used my dog's latest Vet newsletter to outline, and drew away. It does give it a little bit of a sharpness, if I do say so myself.

So here is the finished product!

 

I'm hoping that it turns out the way that I envisioned it originally on Pinterest when we take the pictures next Sunday. Luckily, the snow has fallen, winter is here and it is FINALLY starting to feel and look like Christmas, so I'm not too worried! I can't wait to have some fun next weekend and snap a few photographs to send to fam and friends, AND while using the banner! The best part about my project is that I saved over half off by doing it myself. I didn't have to mess with shipping/handling and I feel good about contributing to this idea all on my own. Hopefully by next Sunday, I can update with actual PHOTOGRAPHS of our engagement session! YAY! Can't wait :)

Project time

So lately when I have a spare minute for the internet, I find myself perusing one of two sites:
1. Pinterest
2. DIY Blogs

I get so much inspiration to MAKE things off of Pinterest, but never follow through because I simply can't find the time. I've been overwhelmed by all the friends I met in college who have started and updated their blogs by filling posts with crafts and easy projects that cost so little. I LOVE to make things, but I usually only ever START a project- it takes a lot to get me to finish. Two of the projects I've completed, successfully, are ones that I got inspiration from on both of the above-mentioned websites.

The first successful project was a DIY Christmas Wreath that I made my mom for Christmas last year. I got the inspiration from "PS... I made this," a site all about DIY projects. It was fairly time-consuming, but well worth it in the end when I could marvel over a job well done, and see the look on my mom's face when she opened it up on Christmas Day.

This was midway through the process- I bought the styrofoam wreath at Joann Fabrics for about 6 dollars, and then purchased about a yard and a half of white felt. You cut the felt into circles, fold them into fourths, and pin the corners onto the styrofoam. It took FOREVER- but luckily, I remember, there was a Harry Potter Marathon on ABC Family.

The finished product, and not the best quality photo, but I LOVE how it turned out. 

The second project I attempted and mastered was one I found on Pinterest. I actually blogged originally about the idea of making a Mason Jar Soap dispenser in this post. This project, in contrast to the wreath, did NOT take long at all. I spent maybe a total of fifteen minutes total to construct it, after buying the Mason Jar at Michael's for about $2.99.

I used a screwdriver to drill a hole for the dispenser, which was sitting in my mom's bathroom closet. I used a jug of bathroom soap to fill the jar, and hot glued the dispenser to the lid.

 

 

 

 

 

 

So my next attempted project is to make a banner for our upcoming engagement photos next week. Our photographer is great and has a lot of awesome ideas, and she recently sent me the link to an Etsy store that makes banners of your wedding date to use in pictures. I really liked the idea, but I don't necessarily want to spend the money when I think it's something I could at least try on my own. So today, my goal is to find the materials needed to successfully complete this project. We are sending Save the Dates to close friends and family and want to do Christmas cards with our date on a banner. I'll check back in this week to let you know how it worked out. The goal is to have it look something like this:

Check back in later! Off to get my craft on.